This study was designed to assess the relationship of the relational and technical skills of the career counselor to five different career counseling outcomes (Client Satisfaction, Placement Skills, Self-Awareness, Psychological Mobilization, and Environmental Knowledge). Two hundred fifty-three university students participated in a study designed…

This article in a series on the next "big" questions in vocational psychology focuses on vocational interventions. The author proposes three primary questions with the first question asking vocational psychologists to consider the role they are going to play in the delivery of effective vocational or work-related interventions. The second question…

We present the PreferenSort, a career counseling instrument that derives counselees' vocational interests from their preferences among occupational titles. The PreferenSort allows for a holistic decision process, while taking into account the full complexity of occupations and encouraging deliberation about one's preferences and acceptable…

Emotion permeates human life, yet receives little attention in career theory and intervention. Long seen as a barrier to avoid, recent conceptual and empirical work indicate that emotion benefits human behavior and development. Advances in the interdisciplinary science of emotion support examining the construct across differential, developmental,…

Immigrants are vital members of U.S. society and are essential contributors to the U.S. labor force. Today, immigrants comprise a significant portion of the U.S. population, however, career assessment research has largely ignored their work experiences, and career counselors are not trained on the intricacies on the delivery of career counseling…

A total of 18 participants ranging in age from 20 to 55 were administered the career style interview (CSI) and completed a follow-up interview 2 weeks later. Consensual qualitative research analysis of follow-up interview data indicated that after completing the CSI, participants "generally" felt helped and also "typically" experienced awareness,…

The innovative responses of vocational psychology and career counseling to the important questions raised by people living in information societies will continue the disciplines' tradition of helping individuals link their lives to the economic context. The questions pertaining to perspectives, paradigms, and practices arise mainly from the…

A population of people that are living longer and working longer invite a reconsideration of interests and interest measurement as individuals make substantial changes in their vocational and avocational pursuits later in life. The relationship of interests to vocational hope and childhood exposure to work is also discussed.

To expand the understanding of how leisure and recreational activities can inform career indecision, this research examined the relationship between career indecision, work engagement, and leisure in emerging adults, 25-30 years of age. Independent sample t tests reveal that career indecisive emerging adults scored significantly lower on all three…

Career indecision is a complex phenomenon and an increasing number of authors have proposed that undecided individuals do not form a group with homogeneous characteristics. This study examines career decision statuses among a sample of 362 12th-grade Portuguese students. A cluster-analytical procedure, based on a battery of instruments designed to…

A major characteristic of the 21st century with significant implications on career decision making is the growing prevalence of Information and Communication Technologies (ICTs). Challenges involving ICT-based self-assessment and self-help interventions aimed at facilitating career decision making are discussed. Specifically, this article focuses…

In the field of career development, there is an acknowledged relationship between career assessment and career counseling. Traditional career assessment and more recent narrative approaches to career counseling are perceived as having an uneasy relationship because of their different philosophical bases. A sustainable future story for the field…

Unemployment is a stark reality in today's economic climate, and many Americans report a fear of loss or decrease in social status as a result of unexpected unemployment. Despite vocational psychology's emphasis on work as a domain of life, very little exploration on how social class shifts impact workers has been conducted. One way to rectify the…

This longitudinal study examines the effects of Israeli counselors' and clients' ratings of their working alliance on clients' career exploration (CE), using a sample of 94 three-session career counseling processes. Results reveal that both clients' and counselors' working alliance ratings increased over time; yet, clients' ratings remained…

This study examined the validity of the Future Career Autobiography (FCA; Rehfuss, 2009), a qualitative instrument designed to capture change or stability in individuals' life and occupational narratives across time as a result of narrative career interventions. Italian female entrepreneurs (N = 82) were randomly assigned into either an…